Some voice messaging systems are presently fabricated in the form of multinode voice messaging systems. A multinode voice messaging system is a voice messaging system which is comprised of two or more nodes, each node comprising a voice messaging system and each node having some information concerning the activities of the other nodes in the system via information exchange among the nodes. As is well known to those of ordinary skill in the art, such information exchange occurs over data paths, examples of which data paths include a voice path control message link between nodes or a communication network link such as, but not limited to, a local area network (LAN). Such data paths provide means for exchange of data which is used in coordinating voice messaging activities in the multinode system.
Voice messaging systems typically utilize a logical entity which is referred to as a personal mailbox. The personal mailbox provides logical access to a set of messages which are identified with an owner of the mailbox, i.e., private messages. In addition, in a typical voice messaging system, the personal mailbox provides messaging facilities such as, for example, storage, playback, creation, deletion and transmittal of messages. The method which is utilized by subscribers to a multinode voice messaging system to obtain access to a personal mailbox is referred to as subscriber access.
In one multinode voice messaging system which is known in the prior art, each node in the multinode voice messaging system uses a distinct subscriber access number for providing subscriber access. In such a system, whenever a subscriber utilizes an incorrect subscriber access number, i.e., a subscriber access number for a node other than that assigned to the personal mailbox for the subscriber, the system will not give the subscriber access to the subscriber's personal mailbox. However, the subscriber is informed of the problem, for example, via a voice message such as: "This node cannot provide access to your mailbox; you must input the subscriber access number for the home node to which you are connected."
In another multinode voice messaging system which could be engineered using the prior art, whenever a subscriber enters a subscriber access number to a node which does not support the subscriber's personal mailbox, the subscriber is transferred to the node which does support the subscriber's personal mailbox and such transfer occurs after the process of subscriber identification/password verification is completed. However, in such a system, after the transfer is complete, the dialog between the subscriber and the correct node starts at the beginning of a subscriber session, i.e., the subscriber must repeat the subscriber identification/password verification process as if it were a new call.
As a result, in such prior art multinode voice messaging systems, subscribers are inconvenienced whenever they input an incorrect subscriber access number by being blocked from access to a personal mailbox or by having to re-enter identification/password data.
In addition to the above-described drawbacks of requiring subscribers to use node-specific subscriber access numbers to access personal mailbox functions in a multinode voice messaging system, the need to require node-specific and even function-specific subscriber access numbers has a further drawback. The further drawback is that coordination of a large number of access numbers becomes a substantial administrative burden.
In light of the above, there is a need in the art for a method of providing a subscriber access to a multinode voice messaging system which enables a subscriber who inputs a subscriber access number at a node in the multinode voice messaging system, which node is different from a home node, i.e., the node which supports the subscriber's personal mailbox, to perform the subscriber's personal mailbox transactions without having to place a second call to reach the home node and without having to re-enter mailbox identification and password information once the home node is reached.